will fell
them?'

A hard task, but Flaxman undertook it. Never did he forget the scene.
Some ominous rumor had spread, and the New Brotherhood was besieged.
Impossible to give the reading. A hall full of strained up-turned faces
listened to Flaxman's announcement, and to Elsmere's messages of cheer
and exhortation, and then a wild wave of grief spread through the place.
The street outside was blocked, men looking dismally into each other's
eyes, women weeping, children sobbing for sympathy, all feeling
themselves at once shelterless and forsaken. When Elsmere heard the news
of it, he turned on his face, and asked even Catherine to leave him for
a while.

The preparations were pushed on. The New Brotherhood had just become the
subject of an animated discussion in the press, and London was touched
by the news of its young founder's breakdown. Catherine found herself
besieged by offers of help of various kinds. One offer Flaxman persuaded
her to accept. It was the loan of a villa at El Biar, on the hill above
Algiers, belonging to a connection of his own. A resident on the spot
was to take all trouble off their hands; they were to find servants
ready for them, and every comfort.

Catherine made every arrangement, met every kindness with a self-reliant
calm that never failed. But it seemed to Flaxman that her heart was
broken--that half of her, in feeling, was already on the other side of
this horror which stared them all in the face. Was it his perception
of it which stirred Robert after a while to a greater hopefulness of
speech, a constant bright dwelling on the flowery sunshine for which
they were about to exchange the fog and cold of London? The momentary
revival of energy was more pitiful to Flaxman than his first quiet
resignation.

He himself wrote every day to Rose. Strange love-letters! in which the
feeling that could not be avowed ran as a fiery under-current through
all the sad brotherly record of the invalid's doings and prospects.
There was deep trouble in Long Whindale. Mrs. Leyburn was tearful and
hysterical, and wished to rush off to town to see Catherine. Agnes wrote
in distress that her mother was quite unfit to travel, showing her own
inner conviction, too, that the poor thing would only be an extra burden
on the Elsmeres if the journey were achieved. Rose wrote asking to be
allowed to go with them to Algiers; and after a little consultation it
was so arranged, Mrs. Leyburn being tenderly persuaded,